You’ve Got a Friend?

If you’ve been following last week’s blog and the comments, you know that there’s been an active discussion about whether dogs can (or can’t) form “true” friendships. This was motivated by an article in Time Magazine by Carl Zimmer that discussed the evidence of friendship in several species of mammals, including dolphins, baboons and horses. In spite of the irony of a cover photo that includes two dogs (and the photographer saying: “I actually had to make sure that the dogs coming in were actually friends.”), the article states “… most scientists think they [relationships between dogs] fall well short of true friendship.” I’m curious who the ‘most’ scientists are…

I suggested to the author that he might want to talk to scientists who study dogs like Barbara Smuts & Camille Ward. Barbara and Camille wrote an article in Bark magazine (Summer 2010) in which they summarize their research that makes it clear that dogs can form friendships. Keep in mind the Barbara Smuts is a well respected scientist whose work on baboons was essential in convincing other scientists that animals can form friendships. She defines friendships as relationships in which individuals choose to spend a lot of time together and engage in friendly, affiliative behaviors. Do we see that in dogs? Of course! So absolutely, I continue to go on record as believing that yes, dogs can form “true friendships.” Here’s some more of my arguments related to that belief.

First, we have to distinguish between intra and interspecific relationships; social relationships between individuals of the same species and those between members of 2 different species. I absolutely agree that, as interspecific relationships, our social bonds with dogs are more complicated than those between dogs. As thoughtfully mentioned in the comments, most of our domestic dogs are completely dependent upon us. We control their food intake, their elimination, who they play with, etc. Thus, the question is a good one as to whether a dog could consider us anything but “keepers” or “guardians,” but not true friends.

Certainly a balance of power does have a profound effect on a relationship, but I would argue that it is still possible to form a friendship with an individual who holds more of the cards than you do. After all, the scientific paper that Zimmer uses to base much of his article on argues that friendship most probably evolved from close relationships between mothers and their young. Even after the young mature, their mothers (in apes, for example), still have more power than their grown young do. But scientists call their close social bonds one of “friendship” nonetheless.

Second, I would argue that, in many cases, dogs may see themselves as having a tremendous amount of power. “Paw her and she’ll pet my head.” “Whine and she’ll give me a treat.” We could argue on and on about who has more power and when, and certainly it’s true that in most cases we control a dog’s access to food, etc, but the power differential isn’t always as black and white as one might think. As mentioned in the comments, our relationship with dogs is an example of a “symbiotic” relationship, but of a specific kind: a “mutualistic” relationship in which both parties receive benefits. (Parasitism is also a symbiotic relationship, but in that case only one member benefits.)

Third, if you look at the paper Zimmer uses as the basis for his article (Seyfarth and Cheney, “The Evolutionary Origins of Friendship.” Annu. Rev. Psychol. 2012. 63:153-177.), the authors define friendship as “enduring social bonds not directly related to mating.” In most species, that includes grooming, play, maintenance of proximity, and the formation of coalitions. If you look at the literature, time spent in proximity is the most universal feature of how “friendship” is defined. And although it’s true that there are many reasons a dog may choose to spend time close to one of his or her “humans,” including insecurity or the Stockholm effect, surely most of us have known dogs who happily and cheerfully chose to spend their time next to a particular person, and sought that person out from all others in a crowd.

Whether dogs can form “true” friendships with other dogs is another matter (although, of course, they are related). And here, again, I’ll argue that good science supports that contention. Zimmer states that “scientists don’t see friendships in wolf packs,” but I’d like to see what that is based upon. Show me the data, please. One argument Zimmer and others make is that most friendships seen in non-human animals are in species in which individuals have life-long relationships (dolphins, apes, etc.). The argument is then made that wolves disperse from their natal packs, and thus dogs have not evolved from a species predisposed to form friendships. But what of the huge packs that are found in Yellowstone Nat’l Park? As I understand it, most large packs are found to be made up of related individuals, exactly the same genetic make up of chimpanzee and dolphin groups. We can’t have it 2 ways here.

And again, (she says with a sigh), dogs are not wolves. They do not automatically attempt to rip the throat out of any canid that enters their territory, for example. Wolves and dogs both are, however, exceptionally social. Unlike most mammals, they live in groups, often defer reproduction to others, often raise the young of others cooperatively (this is often true in dogs, even if the feral males don’t provision their young; “Aunting” behavior is very common in dogs, my Pippy helped to raise all of Lassie’s puppies) and in wolves anyway, hunt together as a cooperative group.

Here’s a behavior not mentioned in Time or Seyfarth and Cheney’s article, but it could (and should) be a subject of study: Greeting behavior. One of the reason I argue so strongly that dogs can form friendships is the extreme variation seen in inter and intra specific greetings. As mentioned in the comments, there are endless examples of dogs who greet another dog or a person with an “over the moon, over the top” enthusiasm only seen to that particular individual. I once saw 2 dogs greet each other who had been apart for over six years and the dogs were border-line hysterical. The frequency and intensity of their whining, licking, leaping etc was several magnitudes their usual behavior. This canine equivalent of hugging, crying and kissing is universally understood as joy, and I would argue it is not anthropomorphic to presume that the emotions being experienced are exactly what we think they are.

This is not to say that friendship between people and dogs is exactly the same, and yes yes yes we need more research on the topic. But scientists are trained to that the simplest explanation should be the first one employed to explain a phenomenon (Occam’s razor), and I would argue that the simplest explanation to what looks like friendship in dogs is exactly that… friendship. That doesn’t mean that all dogs are friends, or that all dogs are friends with their humans. If that’s what we observed (all dogs treating all other dogs the same way), it would actually be evidence against friendship in dogs; the whole point of the concept is that it is a ‘special’ relationship above and beyond the other normal, social relationships, so we should expect to see it only between some individuals.

A last comment about friendships: Here’s a rather lovely saying about it I found while working on this topic: “Love is blind. Friendships tries not to notice.” Anonymous. Love it.

MEANWHILE, back on the farm: I’d love to tell you that Willie and Tootsie are friends, but they still pretend the other isn’t there, even when their heads are smashed together when they greet us or ask for petting. But they both gave us over the moon receptions when we returned from the Dog Writer’s Association of America in New York. (Love Has No Age Limit won two awards, very gratifying!) I’ve got 2 heavenly weekends at home, then off to Phoenix one weekend (invited talk at the Interdisciplinary Forum on Applied Animal Behavior, not open to the public I’m afraid) and Tucson for the Tucson Book Festival the next weekend in early March. If you’re in southern Arizona, come to the book festival March 10-11th!

Here’s a photo I snapped last Saturday from the Empire State Building. I’ve been to NYC several times, but never made it up to the observation deck, and in spite of a brutally cold wind, it was truly fun. I rented the audio tour and learned all kinds of great things about the city, and loved being able to see a complete view of Manhattan. This is me on the observation tower: Brrrr. Wow! Brrrr. Wow! Brrrr. Wow! (etc.)

I love visiting the Big Apple, but always soooo good to get back to the farm!

Comments

I agree absolutely dogs are not wolves, nor do they behave as them. On the other hand, when we are looking at the evolutionary development of behavior, we of course look at where the dog came from. Re: the big Yellowstone packs, most of what I’ve read implies the big packs are loose coalitions with a fair amount of tension and they tend not to be stable. What I’ve read is limited. But again, I’ve read several accounts of the big packs either dispersing, or losing members to other members who killed them in a fight. Surely chimps are capable of waging war too. However, large stable groups are the norm in that anima.

Holding off on having young to help your relatives raise theirs is widespread in the animal kingdom, and probably highly instinctive. Animals with a strong instinct to care for young don’t disperse from their family until the next batch of babies comes around. They see the babies, they have the instinct to nurture, they help out. Certainly a dog who nurses a squirrel’s babies does not do so out of friendship for the squirrel. She does so because the baby squirrel plays on her mothering instincts. Cooperative raising of young is its very own thing, not an argument for nor against friendships between adults.

I want to toss something out there: one of the things that many of us love about dogs is they are NOT political, compared to us. Do they form “coalitions?” I think that part of why we love them is they usually don’t. Sometimes two or more dogs will pack up on a third, true. But we don’t see the sort of alliance-building we see in some other social animals. Male dolphins pal up in part to coerce (force?) females into breeding. Male chimps make friends to build power. Female baboons make friends to protect themselves from harassment and/or protect their young from infanticidal males. And so on. We like dogs for their more straightforward approach to life: friendly dogs like nearly everyone, shy dogs are reserved around everyone, etc. A male baboon might respond only to the distress calls of those few who groom him most, and let others in his family fall to their fate. We love our dogs because they will protect the whole houseful, not just the person who wields the treat or the brush.

I guess our views are all shaped by what we’ve seen and perhaps by our own dogs. I agree 100% that dogs have people and other animals that they are more attached to than others. I suppose what I still have trouble seeing much of is “reciprocity.” I’ve mentioned that Jack sure comes running when he hears me in distress. He intervenes in squabbles between Maddie and the cat. But he also intervenes in squabbles between strange dogs. He comes running if a person he just met makes a sound of pain.

Maddie will go ballistic herding us away from water; she loves to swim but seems to think we are in mortal danger if we try to. And sure enough, the first time we walked her past a public swimming pool and she saw a kid jump in (a child she’d never met), she hit the end of the leash screaming. Some careful work made her learn to ignore it, but what triggered her protective nature was not US in danger of drowning. It was any member of the human race in danger of drowning. Some combination of water + people set off the panic alarms in her head.

So perhaps if I saw more examples of true reciprocity I would start to redefine how I see the relationships between dogs and those they are attached to. I think Em’s stories are interesting because they sound unusual. Perhaps they are, maybe we’ll find they are not. I think (and again am willing to be proved wrong) that what we call “friendship” is an evolutionary adaptation in animals for whom building social coalitions with their own kind provides some benefit to survival of themselves and/or their offspring. I think the evolutionary history of dogs does not have very much evidence of that. Ironically, Trisha, it was your own books that led me to that conclusion. Funny how my reading your work gives me a different conclusion from the author of the works! 🙂

I still say our own relationships with dogs are more parent/child, and a poster in the last thread mentioned that we almost instinctively refer to ourselves often as “mom” and “dad” to our dogs. Again, those subconscious linkings tell us a lot about the true nature of relationships. When talking of my dogs fondly, I usually say “Who’s my girl/boy?” I call my girl dog “baby” and “sweetie.” I call my boy dog my “handsome man.” I refer to my husband as “daddy” when I talk to the dogs. When they are bold I call them “brats” and “stubborn.” Is this the language of mutual friendship? It’s the way most of us (I think) talk to and about our dogs. We even call them “fur kids.” Language is a funny thing because the words we choose tell us a lot about our instincts on the matter. I agree with someone who said that the relationship tends to be different between owners of WORKING dogs.

One last thought: I recently saw a fascinating issue of a nature show about African plains animals and the great migrations. They followed a herd of Plains Zebras. They live similarly to horses, with a harem stallion and his mares, but they come together in bigger herds for migrations. Like most equines, the herd stallion has little to do with raising his offspring. He does protect them, and he will occasionally play with/groom a young colt, but mom does almost all the work.

Well, in this particular herd, one of the suckling colts (a little stud-colt) lost his mom during the migration. They were heading back to the home range when it happened. A fascinating thing occurred: The foal stayed by his dead dam, with whom he was of course strongly bonded. The herd stallion was clearly torn as his mares moved away. He started to follow them, then came back for the colt, then followed the mares. The camera man stayed behind: this was behavior never before seen, since the stallion is typically protective of the mares and cares not as much for the foals.

The nervous pacing went on for some time til the distance grew too great between mares and orphans for the stud to have it both ways. And this is where he did the unprecedented: He let the mares go ahead, and went back for the foal. He lingered, he circled, he paced back and forth and back and forth trying to get the foal to switch his imprinting from the dead mare to the stallion. Finally, after the better part of the day, the little guy looked up and noticed his dad. At this point the stallion started trying to lead the foal away. It took a lot of effort, but eventually the foal followed. The narrator noted that the colt’s survival prospects were low because he still needed to nurse and another mare was unlikely to adopt him. He also noted that this behavior was never before documented, and Plains zebra are well-studied.

A perfect example of fatherly devotion? Absolutely. Will books be updated to say that Plains zebras are doting fathers as a result? Nope. Point being, anecdotes are just that, stories. Individual animals are capable of a wide range of behaviors. Not all animals do what their evolution tells them to do. Genetic variability of behavior helps lead to evolutionary change when circumstances change. There are bound to be some individual dogs who are more inclined to friendship type behavior than others. Perhaps some whole breeds are more inclined than other breeds. But unless we select for it across all dogs, we are not likely to see the trait increase in frequency. And do we select for dogs who show favoritism? Do we select for dogs who offer to do favors for others in return for the promise of favors back in return? I suppose I’m waiting for some sort of evidence besides “dogs certainly like some dogs more than others.”

I do appreciate that these sorts of discussions can take place respectfully on this blog. I’ve been to many others where someone would have stormed off in a huff by now. 🙂

I can’t imagine there are many dog owners with well-socialized dogs who haven’t observed some evidence of at least preference (if we don’t want to use a loaded term like friendship). Once my beagle, Romeo, grew out of the puppy/adolescent stage, and started discriminating among dogs whom he would just greet and whom he would associate, evidence of preference/friendship was so, so clear — two of his friends stand out in my memory, one a little pug/beagle mix who he saw at the dog park. When he saw this dog coming to the park, it didn’t matter what he was doing or which dog he was playing with, he’d come tearing across the park to greet his friend. The two dogs had identical play styles, were very close in size, weight, and build, even looked somewhat alike.

His other friend was our next door neighbor’s labrador. Roxie took such a liking to Romeo that she would follow him home when I fetched him from our neighbor’s yard (they had an Invisible Fence) and try to get inside our house. The two would spend hours and hours and hours together outside wrestling, grooming, or just lying around in each other’s company.

I understand to some extent the fear of anthropomorphizing animals. At the same time, human beings are just another species of social mammal — why is it so strange to make parallels between human behavior with the behavior of other social mammals?

I want to add that there is a reason I am putting so much emphasis on reciprocity. Reciprocity (not immediate reciprocity, but the idea that friends exchange favors over time) implies an understanding that to reap the benefits of friendship, one must actively engage in maintaining the friendship. It implies placing some sort of value on the relationship and seeking to maintain it in a proactive (rather than reactive) way.

And here’s why I think that’s a key component:

When we go to one nursing home, there is an elderly woman there who adores Jack. Every time we go, she seeks him out above the other dogs. Given the choice between interacting with him and anyone else, she chooses him every time. Her eyes light up when she sees him. She has asked me his name, and what kind of dog he is. She tells me he reminds her of a particular dog she had as a girl, and what a great dog that one was. We love meeting her when we go. She spends more time greeting him than the other dogs. She spends more time talking to me than to the other handlers as a result.

And then I go around the room, and come back….. and she is just as happy to see us. And she asks his name again. And she asks what kind of dog he is again. She has no idea who we are. She has no idea that she’s met us before, indeed that she just saw us five minutes ago. It’s sad and sweet, both. I took Maddie once instead. Maddie is a red-headed tri, and Jack is a red-and-white, but they are related and have similar heads. This woman behaved exactly the same way with Maddie as with Jack.

She has no idea of reciprocity. I mean, she understands it at a human level but is not capable of providing it now because she lives in the moment, or in the distant past (alternating between the two). However, there is a certain set of characteristics in my dogs that pleases her greatly. It has to do with things she learned and remembered from long ago. EVERY time she sees my dogs they will be her favorite. Every time she sees them, she will choose to spend more time with them. Every time she sees them, she will seek them out for special attention. And she does not remember any of it.

Do I think dogs have no memory of the immediate past? Well, not to that level. I know our dogs recognize strangers and know them from the familiar. But then again, dogs live more in the “now” than we do. They seem to have pretty poor short-term memories.

My point, though, is that we have to be very careful in how we interpret the behavior of anyone or anything. Things are not what they appear. Joyful greetings and preferring one dog over another could mean lots and lots of different things.

Hence my focus on reciprocity, on the implied understanding that if I do favors for you now, it will bind us in a way that you feel obliged to do favors for me later, and the further implication that the relationship is maintained with intent and not by accident.

And to the poster who said she wouldn’t share a favored truffle either: I agree that we may not WANT to, but convention insists that we don’t eat in front of our friends unless we have enough to share. We know for a fact dogs are perfectly capable of sharing food; bitches share with pups, and wild canids share with their mates. My dogs will allow each other to eat from a common bowl, but they are both sure as heck trying to eat as much as they can so the other doesn’t get it!

I have not been able to get this topic out of my mind, particularly because this week has involved some very unusual interactions between Otis and the dog I would describe as his best friend- a neutered, unusually large male labradoodle (110 lbs) named Jaks.

Jaks’ owner is on vacation, we arranged to pick him up from his “Grandma’s” house, to bring him to the park to walk and play. Grandma has a large property with plenty of space to walk, a friendly dog of her own for company, and ample time to spend with Jaks. Yet his owner and I arranged that I should pick Jaks up several times this week because our observation over the years have been that the dogs seem to miss each other when separated for any length of time-becoming anxious and depressed- and we both believed that they would both be happier if they could continue their regular play meetings.

My observation of Otis and Jaks’ behavior today can only bear that out. The greeting between the dogs, always joyful and more intense than normal greetings, was over-the-top. Jaks was no doubt stressed by his separation from his family, which contributed to this intensity, but unadulterated joy is hard to misinterpret. The dogs, both very cool customers by nature, needed a few minutes of frantic greeting-jumping, running, sniffing- on the lawn before they were calm enough to get into the truck. Grandma’s dog, also present and galloping along behind Jaks, was totally ignored by both parties during this exchange.

After our walk, I brought the dogs back, and that’s where it got very interesting. I tried to call just Jaks out of the truck, for simplicity’s sake, but he wouldn’t come- Otis would, though, and then all three dogs piled out for another manic (this is AFTER two hours of walking and play) dash and wrestle on the lawn. When they calmed down, I tried to call Otis and Sandy back into the truck, and hilarity ensued.

First Jaks barrelled in, then I couldn’t get him out without Otis coming with him and Sandy won’t stay or go without Otis, and since slamming the door on their toes didn’t seem like a good option, they were all in and out of the truck at least three times in thirty seconds. All three dogs are very good about getting in and out on request, and having a grand time practicing- the problem was trying to separate them. Finally Grandma succeeded in letting just Jaks into the house and I called Sandy and Otis to return to the car. Sandy came right away, but Jaks started yowling from inside the house, and Otis wouldn’t leave him. Just stood there, like a statue, facing Jaks inside the house with his brow furrowed and his feet planted, refusing to move. My stone-cold recall that I’m so proud of? Pfft. He did stand still, I suppose, rather than charging the house, but he would.not. come. I had to drag him away. He didn’t actually fight me (very hard), but he crab-walked with his head craned back over his shoulder the whole way.

So if we are all influenced by our personal experiences, I hope that I can be forgiven for flatly refusing to believe that dogs fall short of friendship. So much so, that I would argue that a definition of friendship which precludes the majority of dogs is a flawed definition.

I have no problem with the concept of reciprocity as an element of friendship (wherein one-sided generosity or devotion is identified as not really friendship), but I do worry that insisting on tangible measures of reciprocity obscures the basic relationship. I don’t identify my friends by keeping a mental tally of goods and favors that we have exchanged (I have several close friends with whom I very, very seldom exchange anything tangible) or search my mind for instances of coalitionary aggression (if that’s a prerequisite of friendship then I’m proud to have none, thank you very much). These may be signs, appeallingly quantifiable, that a non-verbal species feels a bond analogous to human friendship, but the signs should not be confused with the bond itself, which most of us experience as a sense of emotional connection. Indeed, while most people enjoy the occasional gift or show of solidarity, and nearly everyone appreciates having someone to turn to for support when in need, deliberate gestures made to establish a quid pro quo are often resented or despised among humans, who view these manipulative efforts as falling SHORT of ‘true’ friendship.

Chimps and Baboons may form friendships for protection from other members of the group, but what about humans? Why do we form friendships? Sometimes we may be seeking to form coalitions to protect ourselves from hostility in the larger group (grammar school comes to mind), but I don’t really think that such concerns are primary motivators in most adults. Maybe what we find so instinctively attractive in canine relationships is the same quality that we like to think SEPARATES us from baboons- the ability to have a truly personal friendship, based on nothing more than mutual trust, respect, and affection, rather than an alliance.

I don’t know, but what I can say is this- my dogs know their friends from halfway across the field after separations of months or years. They do not need to re-establish a relationship before the explosion of joy commences. The have never mistaken a stranger for a friend (at close range…there are a few dogs at the park whose approach is attended with great excitement-which quickly collapses into disappointment once they move within smelling distance) . As an aside, a desire to help a stranger should not, in my view, be any reason to doubt that a dog has a strong attachment to their family and friends. I might help a stranger in distress, too. It has nothing to do with how I feel about my friends. The real test would be if I had to CHOOSE between helping a stranger and helping a friend. In cases like that, (intervening in a dog-dog conflict) both my dogs choose their friends, every time.

Finally, I suppose it comes down probability, for me. I can accept that Otis is particularly inclined to make friends and that this inclination is likely linked to the fact that he DOESN’T love everyone. He affably tolerates most people and dogs. He loves a handful of each with remarkable devotion. The difference is really noticable. But I cannot believe that I own some sort of canis novis, a brave new type of dog, miraculously capable of friendship. I REALLY can’t believe that I own two, totally unrelated members of this rare species, and I REALLY, REALLY can’t believe that they manage, purely by chance, to keep stumbling upon yet more members of this incredibly exclusive club, all totally unrelated, as they venture out into the world.

I suspect that the issue we have here is more one of definition than anything else. If friendship is defined as preference, then I would say my dogs – and most dogs I know – have very finely graduated degrees of friendship, ranging from BFF to thorough dislike. If it is defined as mutual aid … possibly, but dogs often seem to move to protect other dogs they hardly know. Reciprocity … ummm …

Congrats on the awards! Well deserved! I sent a copy of your new book to a couple who adopted the sweetest dog ever from our local shelter recently, and was able to refer to it to help them with a mild issue after the “honeymoon period” ended.

Your comment about dogs being over the moon when they see certain other dogs made me think of Xhufi, my Albanian dog who I adopted after I finished the Peace Corps. She was generally pretty indifferent about dogs. Not reactive, not nasty, and she got along fine with most all dogs most all of the time. She just didn’t seem to care all that much about them. There were a handful of dogs who she seemed to like hanging out with somewhat. But there were two dogs in her life that made her squeal with delight. One lived in Albania, and one was a dog back in the US. Both were male, and I’m not sure if they were intact. (Xhufi had been spayed very young, about 4 months old I think.) She would start going crazy, jumping up and down and literally squealing, as soon as she saw them — no matter how far away they were, or whether she was inside and they were outside and she only caught a glimpse of them out the window while they were walking by. Both dogs liked playing with her, and in general got along with dogs (but I’m not sure if the total crush was reciprocated!) I never saw her act anything remotely like how she acted with those two dogs.

Tricia, in response to your long-awaited second posting on friendship: If this were 40 years ago, I’d say “RIGHT ON,” if I were 30 years younger, I’d say “WORD,” or “SNAP,” if I was religious, I’d say “AMEN.” Since we are in the here and now, I say “THANK YOU.”

You summarized what many of us were trying to say in a clear and compelling way. No matter how we define it, dog friendship exists whether we recognize it or not. I love this thought you had posted: Friends are relatives you make for yourself. Fo shizzle.

We had three dogs all about the same age, all compatible with each other in whatever combination, and they all lived with us for 13+ years. One of them was our bomb-proof, perfect dog, and as a result, he got to go everywhere with us. Rainy and Baern, on the other hand, for a few different reasons, didn’t get to go as many places, so they were thrown together alone a lot. I would say, although it might have started out of necessity, that they formed a deep, loving, and total bond with each other. They slept together, played together, sniffed in the same clumps of bushes together, and Baern would spend hours licking Rainy’s ears as she half-closed her eyes in total pleasure. When Rainy died of severe pancreatitis, Baern was lost. The day we put her down, I took Baern in to see and smell the body, and he lay down in front of me with his ears at full perk and stared into my eyes. I know it’s anthropomorphizing to say it, but he looked like he was trying hard to understand what was going on. It was the same look he would sometimes give me during training sessions, an “I am really, really working to figure out what I’m supposed to do” sort of expression. From that day on, he got increasingly confused, lost interest in walks, did no playing whatsoever, and rarely “flew the flag” anymore. (His full, flowing tail was his pride and joy–a banner that he waved gently in good humor nearly all the time). He went into a steady decline and eventually we put him down. It still breaks my heart to think how he must have felt, losing his love like that–and I truly think he loved her.

Kathy’s comment brings up an issue we’ve danced around but not directly addressed. If dogs can form friendships, can dogs love? Certainly what Kathy describes is the behavior we’d expect to see from people who love each other. I talk about whether dogs can love in For the Love of a Dog, in which I argue, that yep, dogs can. Is it exactly like human love? Of course not. Is it close enough to use the same title for it? I’d say yes, but no doubt many will disagree.

I bought my first copy of Time in at least half of a decade to read the story. One anecdote lifted from the research by Randall Wells ln dolphins jumped out at me – it might have been part of research but this is popular press so it is just mentioned as an anecdote. Two older post-fertile female dolphins began to hunt together and swim closely together. The author says “it’s not quite the Golden Girls, but it’s not all that different either”.

Given this relatively scarce example of friendship, I stand by my belief that the Time author is just more enchanted by exotic animals and gives them more credit for the same acts we see in our domestic animals.

I have never had a dog grieve the loss of another dog until recently. Don’t worry. This isn’t a sad story. About a year ago, my friend came and visited for the weekend and brought his dog. My dog quickly fell in love or at least extreme play preferredness. When Abby left at the end of the weekend, he was inconsolable. His tail was tucked and it took 36 hours to have it gradually raise. I even took him to play with another friend’s puppy to lift his spirits. He played but his tail remained half down and when we left, it was all the way down again. Since then, Abby has visited and left several times and each time we get a smaller and smaller reaction. Given this, I am positive that his reaction was grief over her loss. I wasn’t certain at the time because it was one data point and coincidences happen but now it happens every time, just less so because he is learning she comes back.

If you take out the dogs and substitute two primates in that story, I think many people, maybe even some who write for Time, would find this a convincing portrayal of animal friendship.

I think one of the reasons this discussion is so riveting is not only are beliefs being questioned, it’s possible to see goals being challenged as well. Ultimately I strive for a life of joyful responses between dogs and humans, and among the whole dog species. It is what I take note of as an observer. It is what I try to facilitate as a trainer. (This joy is impossible to constantly maintain, and I accept any flux of emotion as an inherent part of sentient living beings. Sometimes the best we can hope for are benign interactions.) My notions of friendship are really tied to the joyful, loving interactions. To me, separating and categorizing the most pleasant experiences and excluding a notion friendship seems unlikely in any species. Such a massive amount of thinking going on here, so tough to articulate all of the facets, and I deeply appreciate this discussion for giving it a go. I also appreciate anyone who chooses to study this to deepen our understanding, as I think understanding is linked to the best friendships, too. While we wait on science, I can’t think of a reason to adjust the goal of a life of joy and rewarding relationships. Even though some might say dog friendships are either impossible or unlikely, I can still observe those open-mouthed, body-wagging moments and see what I can do to facilitate more of them.

My next door neighbor is one of those people who feels compelled to keep the books balanced; for everything I do for her she has to do something for me. I personally find this kind of tit for tat reciprocity wearing. I help her out when she has a problem (she’s over 80 and living alone) because she’s my friend and it’s satisfying to me to be able to lend a hand when she needs it whether it is removing a sliver from her hand or playing hunt the phone handset (she can’t hear the locator sound but I can). After reading B w/ Cs comments on reciprocity I’ve been thinking about it a lot and to me reciprocity is what each party gets out of it. Finna enjoys chasing the ball I like throwing the ball for her because it gives her so much pleasure to fetch it. That seems to me a reciprocal relationship we both get something we like out of the exchange. It’s a reinforcing feedback; both of us derive pleasure from the game. Finna who had a very unsocialized start in life isn’t always comfortable bringing the ball directly to me. Often she’ll deliver it a foot or two to the side but I’ve been noticing lately that every 7-10 throws she’ll put the ball on a hill where it rolls away and when she does that she waits for me to fetch it even though she’ll chase the ball when she’s tossed/rolled it for herself. Today she brought me her bone and put it in my lap. Unlike Ranger, Finna doesn’t have friends. I’m her safe harbor and the human most likely to understand what she’s asking for but I’m not her friend. Ranger is her playmate and her mentor but he’s not her friend. Observing Finna I want to say that she’s trying to figure out how to be friends.

Like Em’s Otis my Ranger has relationships that I can only describe as friendships both with dogs and people. Ranger is a very social dog he loves dogs and people but with some dogs and some people it goes beyond the “dogs are fun to play with and people pet me and both those things are good” to a level where he is more connected with his friends. Several dogs in the neighborhood are his playmates and they will bark and whine when he walks by their house. Ranger looks to see if they are coming out and after a minute realizes they are not and walks on. One dog is becoming a good friend. This dog is a young Husky that lives behind an invisible fence. To be with Ranger the Husky will charge through his invisible fence even though the shock is set pretty high and you hear him yelp with the pain. When he is inside barking and whining Ranger has to be pulled away even when it’s clear his friend is not coming out. Ranger is clearly distressed that this dog can’t come out to be with him while the inability of other playmates to come out to play isn’t distressing. I don’t know that these two are best friends at this point but they greet each other with joy and even though they have very different play styles you can see them working out a way of playing together that is mutually satisfying. Being delighted to see each other, wanting to be together even at personal cost (Husky–Ranger isn’t in a position where he has to endure pain to get to his friend), adapting their preferences so they both have fun, reacting with distress when unable to be together. It sure looks like friendship to me.

I finally had a chance to read the article today. Trisha, I must say that I didn’t get the same impression of it that you seemed to. I wonder if mood/expectation of reader might influence how things are interpreted?

I don’t want to quote too much because I’m not sure where “fair use” lies on pieces that are not in the public domain. However, the author clearly stated that dogs are capable of forming “friendship-type” relationships with dogs they live with and play with regularly. The author went out of his way to state that relationships with dogs can be “warm and wonderful.” However, the article went to great pains to say that the scientists interviewed (or at least most of them) clearly stated that spending time together and exuberant greetings are NOT how they define “friendship.”

Their requirements are that there is some level of “sharing and sacrificing” and that the animals must put “effort” into it. The friendships were first noticed based on how much time individuals of observed species spent together, but further research revealed the above-mentioned traits.

Moreover, as I expected, the studies showed that the animals in question had greater reproductive success when they had more close friends, and so these traits are more likely to be passed on over generations.

So again, there were plenty of nice things said about dogs and their relationships, but the point of the article was more about animals working to maintain relationships by actively doing things for each other— something that some dogs may do occasionally but very few dogs do regularly.

For an example not involving food, almost all dogs love having the areas around their hips or backs of necks scratched vigorously. It would be oh-so-easy for one dog to do this to another dog using teeth. I can say I have never seen this type of behavior between two dogs, though I’ve never watched dogs courting so I will leave that as a possible exception.

I think where some of the consternation comes from is that as humans, what we say we value most from friends is their love and companionship. Dogs provide both. So again it’s how we define terms. In fact, though, from fellow humans we tend to measure love by how our friends treat us, which typically does involve trading favors of some sort—- the friend who is a great laugh at a party but never available when we need help usually moves down most of our lists in a hurry!

em, I just read your post, and 95% of what you describe are things the scientists in the Time article would not their head and agree with. But again, this is not the sort of behavior they are describing in the article at all, not even close. They are talking of food-sharing, mutual grooming (again, something I’ve not really seen in dogs even though dogs LOVE being petted and scratched– I’ve seen dogs clean faces and ears, but not groom the way horses or primates do), forming coalitions, etc.

I guess I’m shrugging my shoulders, because again its different interpretations of what the researchers were trying to say. Not one of them said dogs can’t form strong, loyal bonds. What they ARE saying is that some animals form human-like coalitions and attachments where they regularly share favors and get no immediate return (which is why simple playing does not count), BUT when you plot out the favor-sharing over six months to two years, it turns out to be pretty well-balanced.

Again, I guess I’m surprised that people are stunned that dogs don’t behave in ways that they would not be expected to behave based on their evolution and selective breeding.

Play is an example of immediate reciprocal altruism: I get benefit and you get benefit at the same time. And again, no one is saying dogs don’t form bonds. The article was not about that at all, at least not how I read the article.

The article also says that while these types of animals are forming friendships, they don’t all form them at all life stages. Male dolphins make friends at a young age and keep them. Female dolphins form temporary alliances while they are of breeding age, and only form tight female friendships when they are done breeding.

I adore my dogs. I go out of my way on a regular basis to make sure they have what they need. I am amazed by how smart they are, how capable they are of learning. I read the article and nodded along because the science seemed sound, it matched what I’ve long known about different types of social behavior among different types of social animals, and it made sense based on what I’ve seen. It really didn’t seem all that controversial to me, and in fact it matches what I’ve read about dog behavior compared to chimp/dolphin/elephant behavior from more than one behaviorist in the past. Including, oddly enough, Trisha’s own books.

Again, it’s all in how we interpret and I just think that “friend” is a word that means so many different things to so many different people that perhaps the scientists should have used something different.

If the author had said: “We all know that most social animals are capable of forming warm bonds with others. However, some social animals go a step beyond and actually exchange favors with others, including sharing food, providing medical care, and helping each other give birth. Dogs and their wolf ancestors fall in the former group and are warm and what we call loving, but they don’t generally provide favors spontaneously; they can however be trained to do so”— if THAT had been said, I don’t know that there would have been much debate at all.

I will admit that an aspect of this has me flummoxed, and then I believe I may be done with the conversation. I’m not sure if it’s more respectful/polite to post this as if I’m writing to Trisha or speaking about Trisha– what’s the etiquette here?– so I’ll do the latter.

Trisha– Dr. Patricia McConnell– has a PhD in animal behavior (I believe). She has made a living as a researcher, teacher, dog trainer, and author. Specifically, her books focus in large part on the differences between human evolution and dog evolution, as well as their similarities. But more narrowly there has been a focus on how our mutual evolutionary pasts can get us into trouble because we have so many conflicts in communication. We love to hug, most dogs don’t. We tend to get excitable and chatter, dogs tend to be put off by that. We tend to rush in for greetings, dog greetings are meant to be deferential. The list goes on, but again there is a strong emphasis on reminding us that our social pasts are very different from that of dogs.

Along comes an article that, in my interpretation, mentions almost the same thing. It states that animals with similar social arrangements to our own develop relationships that are more like our own than scientists once thought possible. And it mentions that despite our wishing to see it otherwise, dogs don’t have similar relationships to our own because they don’t have a similar evolutionary past to our own.

It just seemed to reinforce so much of what she’s already written and lectured. We are very different, yet we’ve formed this beautiful relationship.

I love my dogs for who they are. I don’t humanize their relationships or their emotions. I find their social interactions fairly straight forward. I take great comfort from all the things they do offer me and don’t take it personally when scientists point out that other animals are really good at something that dogs don’t bother much about. There are tons of things— very long lists of them— that dogs do better than apes, or horses, or elephants. No other animal cares so much about figuring US out. No other animal cares so much about determining our intentions or our desires. Which is a wonderful thing. The fact that my dogs do not try to get something for me (or for another dog) that I can’t reach (as a chimp would) or drive food towards my nets without any training (as a dolphin might) or try to groom me with their teeth (as a young horse will) does not make me think any less of them.

When I read the article, it sounded almost like something that might have been pulled straight from “The Other End of the Leash”, save for the lack of conversational tone.

So I guess I’m very befuddled…. I feel like I missed something, somewhere along the way. Actually, I feel more like we are talking about two completely different articles.

Beth w/Corgis has illustrated an interesting phenomena: the myside bias or confirmation bias. After finally reading the article, her argument against dogs forming friendships has gotten even more staunch. I wonder if this bias could also be applied to the Time article’s author.

Here is a great piece from the Atlantic describing this and the big mea culpa the author issued.

I agree that the word, ‘friendship’ the the root of the debate here. I don’t at all object to differentiating between the different relationship styles found in dogs and primates or herd animals, but what I find objectionable is the application of a word in common usage, “friend”, being defined in a way inconsistent with the common understanding of that word. I absolutely support the use of words like affection, friendship, and anger when describing animal behavior that is analogous (though obviously not equivalent) to human behavior. I think that it is valid and intellectually profitable to describe non-mated, non-related animals who display consistent preference, tolerance, and affection for one another as friends. But the whole point of doing so, rather than using a more technical, obscure term or creating a neologism to describe this phenomenon, is to invoke the similarities between the relationship found in the animal and the relationship found in human beings.

It is absolutely silly, to me, to use a term like ‘friendship’ because you feel that a baboon or an elephant displays a similar form of attachment to that found in humans, even though these animals do not display the same exact signs of friendship that humans do (I don’t believe that I’ve ever picked parasites off of any of my friends, nor have I ever seen an elephant pick up another elephant at the airport), only to turn around and say that dogs DON’T experience friendship because they often (though not always) fail to display the exact signs (grooming, food gift exchange), found among baboons. If the intent is to be technical and specific in creating a definition of this type of relationship, then for heaven’s sake, use a technical, specific word! If however, the intent is to express that animals experience attachments analogous to human friendship, then the standard by which animal friendship is defined needs to include ALL animals in which such bonds are observed.

Fascinating article Lisa. And Beth, good for you for trying to work through all this. But no, my reaction to the article was not based on “mood,” and yes, we really did read the same article. Zimmer says: “..most scientists think they [dogs] fall short of true friendship.” And “Thanks to domestication, dogs have become capable of being sweet and loyal to humans, but it’s likely that they treat us as guardians rather than friends. Dogs are neither our best friends nor one anothers–which is not to say they’re not warm and wonderful company all the same.” He states that, “most scientists” think they {dogs} fall well short of true friendship,” although earlier it states that horses can form friendships. This is just not good science. The scientists who study social relationships in dogs (Dr. Barbara Smuts and Dr. Camille Ward for example) both stated, when I emailed them, that the evidence that dogs can form friendships is abundant. And it is the same evidence that is used to argue that horses and baboons form friendships. “Warm and wonderful” is not the same as a scientifically acknowledged ability to form a close social bond that we call friendship, and these definitions are important both biologically and philosophically. Read Harriet Ritvo, “Border Troubles,” for an excellent discussion of why and how we label animals and their behavior matters in terms of welfare and ethics.

Many people believe that their dogs sense when they are unhappy and try to comfort them. The opposite is most definitely true. Does that count as reciprocal altruism? It certainly counts as love, by a definition I read recently.

(I can’t say that I’ve experienced this, but my ‘main’ dog has a socialisation issues and maybe isn’t as good at interpreting human moods as some. My other dog has only lived with us for three months .)

I would suggest that the fact that you cannot say that Willie and Tootsie are friends, is an argument that dogs do form friendships. The fact that we can all basically by observation tell which dogs are friends and which dogs are not friends says something.

I also wonder how much the term “friend” matters. I recently read an article about the social life of cats and they used the term “preferred associates” for what you have called “friends.” It seemed like a odd term, like they were all is business together. Basically, it came down to cats who were more often that chance would predict in close proximity to each other, would groom each other and would go to food sources together.

I think the solution to this issue is more research to show that dogs do form friendships, since I think we all know they do. GO BARB and CAMILLE!

Another post relating to mutual grooming. In addition to grooming faces and licking mouths, my dogs and their friends/preferred associates will groom one another, regularly pulling burrs out of each others coats.

The idea of reciprocity or knowing reciprocity is a tough one. When we do a favor for a friend, are we doing it consciously because we think we will get something in return in the future? It seems to me if we are concerned at the moment with reciprocity, then the friendship is questionable. I am not a biologist, but I think we may get a oxytocin burst when we do a favor for a friend, so it is its own reward. To imagine that animals do things for friends out of the expected future reward argues for a more complex thinking process than humans have. We know that humans stroking a dog produces oxytocin in both the human and the dog, so it is possible (likely?) that a dog grooming another also produces oxytocin in both animals.

I have at least two examples of dogs protecting “friends” in a way they would not protect others. My previous Golden Dexter was a member of a social pack who played at a local park. My Dexy’s most frequent playmate was a younger Lab named Hudson. One day a young intact male Husky joined the group and in short order started humping Hudson. Dexy went over and got the Husky off of Hudson with a growl and some posturing. After the Husky stopped humping, everything was O.K.. My second example is intraspecific, we live on a dog park and we had a cat (who passed away in December) who was very much a preferred associate of our dogs. The dogs regularly protected the cat if the cat was out and about in the dog park. Just a note, the cat also regularly groomed the dogs.

Another important aspect of friendship is trust, knowing that the other will react in a positive manner to your actions. I think this is critical in dog relationships and explains why dogs are friends with some dogs and not others. This is especially important since the behaviors in most dog play is so close to aggression. This is where intraspecific relationships also come into play. My Golden will only wrestle with me even though she is affectionate with many people. She trusts me to understand the game and respond accordingly.

I feel a bit ashamed to enter in such high level of conversation, anyway I have some thoughts to share. In my personal scale of values “true friendship” is a choice of the heart not of the brain, an impulse towards another human being which has nothing to do with reciprocation or mutual interest. Have I ever seen this behaviour in dogs? Definitively YES either versus other human beings or versus other dogs. Perfect example is how Bella came in our family: she was in a foster family when her human suddendly died. She saw us twice, once during the funeral and once three months before. She stayed one week alone at the foster home being fed by some relatives leaving nearby. When we went to pick her up, while we were speaking with the relatives she jumped in our car (the doors were open as it was summer) and strongly refused to come down. We thought at first she liked being in the car but it was hot, she was panting and refusing to come down. When she saw we were leaving she stayed very relaxed in the car and when we arrived home she came down immediately with us. It’s three years she is with us and we have never seen her do it again. We even tried to replicate the behaviour (with my sister’s car for example) but no way. She chose to come with us? I definitively believe YES, had she any guarantee of how would have been her life with us? No.. It was an istant bond never questioned by either party and I feel very grateful to have experienced it. As far as dogs versus dogs is concerned I’ve experienced the same behaviours described by Beth and I will not go through it again. Just thanks to everybody for the wonderful and inspiring thoughts shared.

On the topic of love, I thought I was a lot less opinionated than I am on the topic of friendship. Then by the time I got to the end of writing this post, I realized I did have a strong opinion and came back and re-wrote these first two sentences.

After a sentence or two, the original post started like this: I can’t define “love” like I can define friendship. In other words, I don’t have a working definition of love when it applies to humans, so how could I possibly make a guess on whether dogs can love or not?

We use the word, love, in so many different ways (I LOVE that food. I LOVE my spouse. I LOVE that book. …) We use the term “love” in so many ways, that that best definition I can come up with is that love is just an extreme form of “like”/preference. Hence by my thinking, love = “like a lot”. I can’t remember how or if Trisha tried to define love in her book.

If that is the definition of love that one is willing to go with, then I can’t imagine how it would be possible for almost any animal *not* to be able to love. After all, if one can have an affinity for something, there is likely to be an variableness in affinity to various objects and creatures. The higher end of the spectrum of “like” would be by definition “love” for that animal.

What I suspect we are really talking about is more of this definition: love = “like another creature a lot”. If we restrict the discussion of love to feelings of affinity for other living creatures, then we could say that not all animals can love, since I understand that some animals are solitary animals. But that would not apply to our very social dogs.

This post clarified your previous one. It also removed some of the intellectual ambivalence I had in comparing human friendship with dog friendship which I just cannot do.

With your clarification, yes dogs clearly favor particular humans/other dogs/and various other species. Some of those interactions I would use the word love. I can tell without hesitation who, Baruch’s (my BC) favorite beings are. And surely it is a love story between her and those interspecies extended family members.

[I lent your book ‘Love has No Age Limit’ to a new client who has done tremendous work with her rescued Pom. It was returned yesterday with a note saying: Thank you so much. I wish I had read the book 3 months ago.”

Off topic: I just finished with the pleasure of watching your latest video. Thank you for making this available to all of us.

A Comment: Why do you always make me cry at the end of your videos? ;-( On one hand, I think you are so brave for doing something that you know is going to make yourself emotional. I see it as being a good role model. On the other hand, I hate crying at the end of your videos.

A Request For Future Blog Post: As part of the talk, you mentioned that you would blog about research done on autistic kids and how that research could be applied to helping dogs. Specifically, you mentioned 3 exercises that you were going to do to Willie that would calm the para_something_ system. I may have missed that blog post. In case you haven’t gotten to it yet, I wanted to put in my loud vote for more info on this topic!! The stuff you are covering now is fascinating. I’m just suggesting that when you have a moment, if you could follow up on that thought…

A Comment: I loved watching the video and seeing you mention at times about discussions on your blog. It was fun because I read the blog and I already knew what you were talking about.

To JJ: Thank you so much for the reference to the new Alex study, I have a few things to tie up here before I can watch it, but can’t wait. And thanks also for the post about the cat saving a woman’s life (now there’s a topic for a blog!) Your comment reminds me how much I learn from the people who read and comment on this blog; I am truly truly grateful for it. But especially thanks for the reminder to get back to the exercises Scott Anderson taught me to calm the parasympathetic system in autistics and dogs like Willie. I have some videos and I’ll put them on the short list.

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Comment

Name *

Email *

Website

SUBSCRIBE VIA EMAIL

Email Address

About the Author

Patricia B. McConnell, PhD, CAAB is an applied animal behaviorist who has been working with, studying, and writing about dogs for over twenty-five years. She encourages your participation, believing that your voice adds greatly to its value. She enjoys reading every comment, and adds her own responses when she can.

LEARN MORE FROM PATRICIA’S BOOKS & DVDs!

Patricia is known the world over for her clear and engaging books and DVDs on dog training and canine behavior problems. You can also “meet” Patricia in person on her seminar DVDs, from The Art & Science of Canine Behavior to Treating Dog-Dog Reactivity.